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Lovin Malta's Xmas Giveaway: Win An Awesome 3D Printer

Are you crazy about 3D printing? Have you been dying for your own 3D printer at home? Well, now's your chance to get one. Lovin Malta has teamed up with Open Tinkers to offer the prize of a lifetime: A Makeblock mElephant 3D printer worth €665.

To win this awesome prize, all you have to do is come up with a cool 3D-printed corporate gift idea that Lovin Malta can give to its clients to mark the New Year. The brief? Help our clients remember us throughout 2017.

You can describe the idea in words but you'll get extra points for actual designs because we want to give the printer to somebody who can make best use of it.

You have 10 days to send in a winning submission, including files, PDFs, sketches etc. Email hello@lovinmalta.com with your idea. Subject line: Open Tinkers Competition.

Closing date: December 26th.

Introducing Open Tinkers

Open Tinkers is a local business catering for local makers, DIY enthusiasts, students and experts a-like. The structure of Open Tinkers surrounds three main facets; make, learn and shop. Visitors can explore the online shop of Open Tinkers, which for now is mainly made up of Makeblock products but will expand soon. For makers the Open Tinkers website serves as a platform for fabrication services with relative ease, and for the enthusiasts there’s an array of courses, whether it’s 3D modelling, digital fabrication or open hardware. Open Tinkers courses are multidisciplinary and hands-on! It can be somewhat summarised as an open source playground for learning about technology through hands-on tinkering and prototyping.

The journey of Open Tinkers started with dfab.studio back in 2010, which is a studio focusing on applying digital fabrication to the design, architecture and engineering fields. The progression with Open Tinkers occurred with the need to expand and create an online and offline space where anyone from beginners to advanced enthusiasts can become makers or through Makeblock get accustomed to programming and utilizing robots.

“We’ve been slowly seeing the maker movement grow in Malta and have recognised the importance of empowering young people to not only embrace technology but to master it,” said Steve DeMicoli, architect and founder of Open Tinkers. “We are at a cross-road where the democratisation of technology has culminated in novel and unprecedented opportunities that allow anyone with access to the internet and a desire to learn to shape the world around them; to literally create custom technology to suit anything they need or desire. Whether it is a custom home automation system, a 3D printer, a robot or a fish feeder!”

The point of Open Tinkers is to utilise it as a means for connecting like-minded people interested in 3D design and modelling, laser cutting, 3D printing, CNC milling, machine-hacking, coding and open source electronics.

The Makeblock product range centralizes around STEM educational programmable electronic robotic kits; which also include 3D printers, plotters and robots. Aside from Makeblock products and kits, Open Tinkers also has access to dfab.studio’s cutting-edge workshop facility, which include wood working machines, 3D printers, a laser cutter and CNC milling. “We’ll be announcing an appointment-based Open Days during December and January, so like our Facebook page for further updates, and check out the website and start making at www.opentinkers.com”

Open Tinkers is actively seeking to expand its network and establish new relations with third parties and like-minded people and companies.